Neither did a guy named Fred Astaire who was also rejected the first few times he knocked on Hollywood's door.

The man with the most famous feet in history was given a short response to his first screen test by a studio bigwig that read, "Short, Balding & Can't Dance A Step"

Guess they didn't know how to place him.

If Mr. Astaire had taken that blow seriously and given up, we would not only have lost a great icon, but he wouldn't have had the sweet revenge many years later, of framing the aforementioned note and putting it on the mantle above the fireplace in the livingroom of his palatial Beverly Hills estate.

Which is just what he did.

But he was only able to do it because of one small perservering step.

Or many, many thousands.

Keep dancing, Donavan. The mantle awaits.

The morning after the night where I felt like giving up, I received an e-mail from an old and dear friend.

She told me of the dream she had the night before.

In it, I was plunging a toilet full of poo. Fitting, not only because of my lifelong companion, but also because I feel that my life has turned to shit.

As I stood knee deep in crap, my friend handed me a note.

It read, "SNAPPER"

According to my friend, the note had been given to her in the dream by my mother. She went on to say that snapper was a message that meant hold on tight. Sink your teeth in.

Don't give up.

Great, now my mother not only comes into my dreams to whip my ass into shape, she also drops into my friends dreams to give me operating instructions.

I guess some mom's don't give up too easily.

And neither do some sons.

But in order to hang on tight to the tomorrow of my dreams, I must let go of the Disneyland balloons of my childhood and let them carry my heavy baggage into the clouds of forgiveness.

As I lay down my grief and hopelessness and hold my aspirations in the vice grip of my self-actualization, I feel both grounded as a rock and as light as a feather.

A feather in the hair of a hippie walking naked on the beach on the first day of summer.

For the first time in a long time, I feel free.

I feel Freberg.

Stretch, breathe, let go, hang on, walk tall.

And on that walk, I'm gonna bite into life like a crunchy apple, fresh from the tree of free.

July 01, 2005

I’ve been taking prescription anti-depressants for about two months now and as the wet blanket of gloom is lifted from the live wires of my insides, heavy weight hopelessness is being replaced by bright sparking currents of high voltage anger, fear and nerves.

I am alive, but not altogether well.

I have always been a card carrying hypochondriac but this is ridiculous.

My daily disease varies like a Scottish summer.

Hyperthyroid, Diabetes, Cancer….

Also known as:

Stress+Creativity+Boredom=I’m dying!

And you know what?

I am.

Maybe not next week, next year, or even next Democrat…but eventually.

And as I approach my “halfway to 70” birthday, that eventually is getting closer and closer.

OK, maybe it’s true, the grass does grow by itself and spring does come when we do nothing.

Wanna know what else happens?

A whole bunch of nuttin’.

The people who have spun their straw into gold and have things like good credit and health insurance didn’t get there by just sitting around saying "Om" and contemplating their navels.

They did it by hitting the accelerator pedal and following their dreams.

I haven’t been doing much of either.

Let Go & Let God?

I don't think so.

How about, "Trust God and Let's Go!"

I’ve been sitting on my ass and waiting for my ship to come in instead of diving into my gene pool and swimming out to meet it.

I feel like a plane that has taken off from the paradise of childhood, flown through the stormy eye of growing up and is now in a holding pattern above a barely visible landing strip called manhood.

I've been in the clouds so long, I'm getting airsick.

What am I waiting for?

After a lot of therapy, I can finally answer that question.

I am waiting for my father to come and rescue me.

My mother has left the planet, so, other than in my dreams, she ain't coming.

My father however, is still here. He lives a mere three miles from me, but may as well be on the moons of Mars.

A bit of history, a bit of a fairy tale darker than Grimm, then we shall move on and I will go back to posting more fun stuff like Japanese girls in their underwear and pictures of unicorns having sex with mermaids.

So, it is the end of 2000. My mother has been dead just long enough for her ashes to cool. My father has a speaking engagement at a college. A wonderful night was had by all. Our little clan is pulling away in a limo.

An average day in the life of the family Freberg.

A knock at the window.

I hit the down button and the smoky glass drops to reveal an out of breath woman.

Immediately, I get a bad feeling.

Immediately.

Strange I should feel this way because this is not an overly out of the ordinary occurrence. I'd seen hundreds of people ask for my fathers autograph. I never thought a thing of it.

But this was different.

This autograph hound was a pit bull.

The DNA that was swirling in my brain, the end product of billions of years of evolution would serve me well. My intuition was hinting to me that, however innocuous this moment seemed, it was actually the beginning of the end of my father, or at least the end of any and all contact with him.

“Mr. Freberg, may I get an autograph?”

Velociraptor!

Run!

My father gets out his signature roller-ball pen and signs his manhood away like a pact with the devil.

For the whole heartbreaking work of staggering hideousness, and it's heinous aftermath, you will have to read my book.

But I’ll give you the extended cliff notes…

She gets into the Limousine.

“I was so sorry to hear of your wife’s passing, I read about it in the Hollywood Reporter”

Red flag.
Alarm bell.
Hair on back of neck at full attention.

“Here’s my card, I’d just LOVE to manage you”

I'll bet you would.

My father was like Humpty Dumpty, in pieces after the death of his life partner of more than forty years.

All the kings horses, all the kings men.

One very shiny red apple.

He starts an affair with this woman, a mere six months after my mother’s passing.

My mothers cigarettes and Vogue magazines, still at her bedside. Her clothes, still smelling of perfume. Her coffee cup still stained with lipstick. The TV still tuned to American Movie Classics.

Fuck a doodle-doo.

One afternoon, I come over.

He is in tears.

On the floor.

A humongous black garbage can sits in the center of the bedroom like the monolith from 2001.

“My girlfriend said that I have to get rid of all your mothers things by sundown or she’s coming over to turn the house on its side and let it all go into the dumpster”

Rushing the grieving process.

Tsk, Tsk, too brisk.

I watch my father taking my mothers things and throwing them in the trash.

I am speechless and too shocked to act.

Not just shocked that he'd throw her things out, shocked that he'd throw ANYTHING out.

A notorious pack rat, my father never trashed a thing in his life, and he begins by throwing away the very things he should be keeping?

Feng-Shui was never Freberg.

High heels go into the giant rubber black hole.

My insides turn to ice in an instant, my face a burning ball of fiery coal.

I call my sister, “Dad’s gone mad”

I tell him that I am more than willing to slowly help him collect my mother’s things.

“I tried giving some of her jewelry to Betty, she said it wasn’t her taste”

Classy.

He sits me down and tells me that I am being cut off from the family money.

I wonder why?

I notice a catalog of engagement rings on his desk.

There’s my answer.

Mayday.
Mayday.
The ship is going down.

I grab an extra-large Fed-Ex envelope from his office and stuff it with my mother’s private letters and coffee stained journals.

It is the only earthly thing I have left of her.

The next day, my sister and I arrive at our home away from home to see him.

Gee, thats funny, my key isn't working.

Knock Knock.

Who’s there?

My dad?

My dad who?

My dad’s who's lost his marbles and is about to marry the wicked witch of the west and holy shit what the fuck is going on and how do I stop this and make him come to his senses and realize that he is unable to make life changing decisions in the wake losing his wife and I’m so afraid I feel like I’m going to shit in my pants and throw up at the same time and I feel so helpless and mom, mom, mom, oh god what’s happening, this has to be a dream, just a bad dream, yes, just a dream, no, oh god, no, this is real and I’m going to lose both my mother and my father in one fell swoop like a plane crash, like some terrible accident and what did I ever do to deserve this and oh I feel so sick oh god, no, no, no…

The doorman* comes up.

*SEE ALSO: LIKE FAMILY

He is nearly in tears.

“Donavan, your fathers new girlfriend changed the locks. She told me to ask you to leave. I’m so very sorry. This is just awful. Oh god. Your mother, your mother”

His eyes are glass.

Acid spews into my throat like an erupting volcano.

The tears burn.

Fade out.

Fade in:

FUNERAL HOME: INTERIOR
MORNING
ONE WEEK LATER

We see Donavan and his sister.

Donavan: We’re here to pick out a headstone for Donna Freberg, my father should be meeting us.

Mortician: I don’t understand.

Donavan: Huh?

Mortician: It’s just that your father was already here yesterday with his lady friend. They already picked out a stone from the catalog and it’s all set.

Sis: That can't be. He said he would meet us here today.

Donavan: What the hell do you mean, exactly? He came WITHOUT us? We were supposed to have a say in this! We wanted the headstone to reflect my mother, we wanted it to be humorous and eloquent and speak of her kindness and sarcasm and warmth and...

Mortician: The headstone is already in the ground, sir.

Right along with my fathers conscience.

Dad?

Dad?

Daddy?

Hyde.
Hyde.
Hide.
Jekyll.

We never see or hear from him again, save for a short meeting with him and his new wife who tells me in no uncertain terms that I will never, ever get the chance to meet with my father ever again.

Son.
Daughter.
Granddaughter.
Extended Family.

No contact.

Zero.

Sometimes life brings you roses, and sometimes it brings you thorns that stab into your heart like lemon juice on an open cut.

It’s been four years, and there isn’t enough sugar in the world to turn this sourball of suffering into lemonade.

All I can do is grieve.

But I can’t even do that, because he isn’t dead.

But he may as well be.

Which brings me to my latest dream.

My mother makes an appearance again.

This time, in the flesh.

We are standing in my childhood room.

Night.

Stage lights brighten the darkness.

She says, “It’s me again”

She is looking lovely. Young, fresh, fully made up.

She says, “It’s really me”

She is wearing a mini skirt and white leather go-go boots. I can smell the Chanel in the air.

You bet your ass it’s really her.

She is holding a leash, at the end of which are my former dogs, groomed and ready to go.

“They’re with me now, cookie. I’m finally out of here, but Dad is staying”

I begin to cry.

She says, “He’s in the next room. He’s never waking up”

“What? Well…what if I just go and try to talk with him? Maybe he’s just napping. I’m going in there and…

She interrupts me.

“Napping my foot”

She lights a cigarette.

Definitely her.

On the exhale, she says…

“He’s as good as dead”

She takes my hand and looks straight into my eyes.

“But these dreams are as real as day”

As she says this, light begins to stream in the window.

She smiles.

“Write and Act and Draw On The Walls, it ain’t a half bad way to make a living kid, and YOU can do it like a million bucks. Get back to the future and get your ass in gear. Carry the torch that your father has dropped and it'll light your path like the son”

Just before she and my dogs walk out the door and into the light, she turns around and says…

“Get out of this house before it falls to the ground, but before you do, go take a good look around the basement”

She vanishes.
The house begins to shake and quake.

I run down to the basement.

I flip on the lights.

It’s a recording studio.

Microphone.
Scripts.
Photographs of my father holding me in his arms as a small boy.
He is radiating love.
I am wearing my red rain boots and radiating it right back.

A giant mirror is on the wall.

It reflects my image, a strong and capable man.

A small card is on the floor.

YOU CAN’T FIGHT WHO YOU REALLY ARE

Got it.

I put the card in my wallet, and as I do, a boy appears at the microphone.

A small blonde haired boy with blue eyes.

The boy in the pictures.

Me.

It is in that moment that I realize that one does not need to give up their childhood in order to become an adult.

You can carry it with you.

And damn you lady, I WILL see my father again.

Every time I close my eyes and click my red boots together.

“Come on, Baby, I’m taking you with me”

“Where?”

“Back to the future!”

I pick him up and throw him over my shoulder just like a fireman.

Or maybe, just like a man on fire.

"I’ve got you now, Baby Boy Freberg”

He tightens his grip.

His breath smells like candy.

His hair is as soft as rabbits fur.

The house is coming down around us in big chunks of brick and soot.

I run outside like a bat out of hell.

In the driveway is a big black Range-Rover.

We get in.

I fire it up and engage the four-wheel drive.

Bumpy roads, be damned.

1.21 Jigawatts!

Outside the car, I see a sign.

DO NOT BACK UP, SEVERE TIRE DAMAGE

Inside the car, “Hollywood” is flashing on the navigation system.

I pull out of the driveway and I can see the house in ruins in the rear-view.

Forward.

As I round the corner, my father stands before me.

His once loving kind eyes are empty black sockets.
His clothes are tattered.
He walks in a daze, coming towards me.
His skin is a pale shade of green.

Zombie.

The Baby Boy in the seat next to me says, “It isn’t him anymore, it isn’t him”

No, it certainly isn't.

I run the walking dad over, and as I do, dark demons pour out of him and he turns slowly back into his old self.

I can see him in the rearview mirror.

He looks right as rain.

He is smiling and waving goodbye.

Curly hair.
Suede Jacket.
Big Glasses.
Bigger heart.

Good old dad.

My childhood self leans out the window and yells, “Bye Daddy! See you in the theater of my mind!”